So you think the Christmas tree you are buying is fresh?

Scott S · #1 (**permalink**) 10-24-2009, 11:12 AM

The tree harvest started on Monday the 19th of October this year, my home is nearly surrounded by Christmas Tree farms and until Thanksgiving the trees will be flying nonstop..

The largest selling day historically is the day after Thanksgiving and by then the trees will be a month old. So when somebody on a lot tells you the trees are fresh cut, most likely they are lying.

Mark IV · #2 (**permalink**) 10-24-2009, 11:49 AM

A local tree grower customer here told me the trees must be cut before the freeze or the sap will have run down the trunk and the needles will fall as soon as they get inside and get heated. Is this true?

tcrist · #3 (**permalink**) 10-24-2009, 12:09 PM

My father drove trucks for years hauling anything and everything at one time or an other. Back 30+ years ago he was hauling Christmas trees at the end of July. They take them to cold storage until it was time to set up the Christmas tree lots.

Terry

Scott S · #4 (**permalink**) 10-24-2009, 03:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mark IV

A local tree grower customer here told me the trees must be cut before the freeze or the sap will have run down the trunk and the needles will fall as soon as they get inside and get heated. Is this true?

Perhaps for some of the Pine and Spruce but I am sure the Nobel and Douglas fir produced in this region don't have that problem, we ussually don't get a serious freeze here until well after the Holidays.

EarlsflyinCobra · #5 (**permalink**) 10-24-2009, 03:56 PM

That sure seems like an EXPENSIVE way to harvest Christmas Trees......seems like that would ADD a lot to their cost

Scott S · #6 (**permalink**) 10-24-2009, 06:13 PM

Oregon sells around 6 million trees a year, some of the fields are a half a mile across. I have seen as many as four helicopters on one field and the little brown fellows running from pile to pile faster than they came across the border.

At times within a mile radius of my home there could be as many as ten helicopters going at once.

Scott S

Excaliber · #7 (**permalink**) 10-25-2009, 10:20 PM

The tree's in Hawaii were always fresh,,, off the boat.

bomelia · #8 (**permalink**) 10-26-2009, 04:33 PM

I used to like live trees, but then I got sick and tired of the work, the mess, before, during, and after the holidays. Sorry for sounding like a Grinch, but they just are not worth it, especially when you can buy the artificial trees available today. Assemble it, plug it in, and I am back on the couch sipping nog and watching football.

When you stop and think about it for a moment, the whole idea of sticking a huge dead, flamable piece of pine scrub in your house is, well, wierd.

Mike

Scott S · #9 (**permalink**) 10-26-2009, 05:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bomelia

Assemble it, plug it in, and I am back on the couch sipping nog and watching football.

When you stop and think about it for a moment, the whole idea of sticking a huge dead, flamable piece of pine scrub in your house is, well, wierd.

Mike

There is a local tree company here that takes a cut tree, shakes it, fumigates it, and then dresses it up with lights and ornaments. They then take a photo of the decorated tree, take all the lights and ornaments off put everything in a box with the plastic wrapped tree and send them to customers in Japan.

Once in Japan the customer looks at the photo and attempt to decorate the tree EXACTLY as the photo appears. You can have one of these "special" ready to assemble fresh cut trees for around a couple of $1000....

Jamo · #10 (**permalink**) 10-26-2009, 05:50 PM

We used to buy live trees and then plant them. I have a Sequoia out back that in a thousand years will be one big sumb!tch.

I finally gave in a few years ago and let my wife buy a really nice fake basturd. I hate that it's fake, but I love that she's the one who puts it up.

Got the Bug · #11 (**permalink**) 10-26-2009, 06:24 PM

I usually try and make a case for not having a tree, but that plan never flies.

For years, we used to go up in the mountains right outside of Santa Cruz to cut a fresh tree week or so after Thanksgiving. More often than not, the tree would be dry and brittle by Christmas day.

About 4 years ago, we started buying a cut tree from a local nursery that was grown in Oregon. Those things last and rarely drop any needles. The cut tree imported from Oregon might be months old, but it's much better than the tree I cut myself.

Buzz · #12 (**permalink**) 10-26-2009, 09:59 PM

Don't feel bad dudes - people even have REal Christmas trees down here. We went fake about 10 years ago. No skin off my nose - wifey always puts up the tree - but I sure do miss the smell of the REal thing as it dried into a serious fire hazzard by new years eve!

Yes, folks down here celebrate Christmas well into the new year and only stop when the hangovers and sleep deprivation become a clear and present danger to life, career and relationships.

trularin · #13 (**permalink**) 10-27-2009, 10:27 AM

I cut my own each year.

bomelia · #14 (**permalink**) 10-27-2009, 07:15 PM

If you miss the smell, they sell that in a can, or you can buy a Yankee candle that fills in nicely.

Mike

Buzz · #15 (**permalink**) 10-28-2009, 07:12 PM

Lol! Yeah the canned pine tree smell was popular for a while but kinda died out. It's funny how, as advanced or evolved as we like to think we are, it's often the truly primal things like smells and tastes and raw emotional responses that leave the most indelible impressions on our psyches.

This might sound funny coming from an island boy, but Christmas has never been quite the same without that ol' pine tree scent.

Excaliber · #16 (**permalink**) 10-28-2009, 10:15 PM

I don't know, I never cared much for replica Christmas trees. Just something about that whole replica, plastic, wanna be thing I guess...

Thats why I drive a real ERA.

Wes Tausend · #17 (**permalink**) 10-29-2009, 02:32 AM

...

When I wuz a kid we had a real tree. The same one, year after year. For a long time I didn't know any better. We don't have any trees in North Dakota. We wuz too poor to buy a new one from out of state every year. Sure all the needles fell off ...except for a couple mummified ones. We painted the tips of bare branches green ...with borrowed paint. Christmas smelled like linseed oil.

We decorated the tree with popcorn. And brightly colored Easter egg shells we got from the neighbors. We were too poor to afford dye for our own egg ...which we all shared at Easter. I used to sneak some popcorn off the tree til I got caught. Got nuttin for Christmas that year. Coal was for heat.

Other years, for presents, I used to get a brand new pair of shoes, li'l Abner ones, every Christmas except for a couple where we wuz too poor to buy shoes. But I got a new lace them years. Naturally I put it on my best shoe. I hadda put my best foot forward all the time. My brother got the other lace.

Them were the days. Now I gotta work on Christmas all the live long day. Don't get no respect.

Wes

...

TButtrick · #18 (**permalink**) 10-29-2009, 06:59 AM

Mine comes out of the box with lights attached and all.

bomelia · #19 (**permalink**) 10-29-2009, 09:33 AM

Mine comes out of box too, with lights. I guess its disposable since when the lights burn out, you have to buy a new one.

392cobra · #20 (**permalink**) 10-29-2009, 09:54 AM

Mike,
I was wondering if this was the girl in your avatar's Mom ?